Phil Coulson and the Zombie Apocalypse
by milady dragon
Summary: The Zombie Apocalypse caught up with Phil Coulson in the public toilets of a gas station outside of Chicago, Illinois.


Phil Coulson and the Zombie Apocalypse

Author: Milady Dragon

Disclaimer: I don't own anything here.

Author's note: I'm not sure where this came from. It's...well, yeah.

Beware of crack, brain-eating, and general zombie wackiness. Oh, and there's a line about necrophilia, but nothing like that occurs in this or else I would have tagged it. There's also very dubious science in this. And I mean dubious.

This doesn't have any particular place in canon, only that Skye has her powers and Mack and Bobbi are friendly sorts in this and Trip is alive. Also, the Avengers know that Coulson is around as well.

Zombies were damaged and destroyed in the writing of this story. So, if you are currently a zombie and you are easily offended, please do not read. I have nothing against zombies as a rule as long as they don't try to eat my brain, but if they do I reserve the right to defend myself.

Although, I'm not so sure eating my brain would be a good idea. It came up with this mess, after all.

There are also hints of Clint/Coulson in this, just so you know in case you're not into that sort of thing.

* * *

The Zombie Apocalypse caught up with Phil Coulson in the public toilets of a gas station outside of Chicago, Illinois.

Well, one of the first lessons he'd learned when he'd joined SHIELD was that a person's dignity was usually the first thing to be lost, and being attacked by five zombies in a grimy men's room certainly qualified.

Phil managed to take out four of them with a toilet paper roll and the soap dispenser, before the fifth got its teeth into his shoulder. He easily twisted the creature's head off, but by then the damage had been done.

And so, the once-human(ish) Director of SHIELD cleaned himself up as best he could, all the while looking at the obviously dead face in the broken mirror over the sink.

Although, the glowing blue eyes weren't something he'd seen in the five zombies he'd dispatched.

"Huh," was his verbal reaction.

Phil was just a bit upset at the tears in his suit. And then he realised that he shouldn't be concerned about that anymore, since it was apparent that he was now a zombie…albeit one that was slightly un-zombie-ish.

Shouldn't he have been obsessed with eating brains? That was acceptable zombie behavior. Not bothered by the ruined Dolce and Gabbana wool blend that was now ripped and covered in the remains of his left shoulder.

He felt…not alive. Yes, he'd been dead before, but he really couldn't recall how that had felt since he'd been…well, dead, not to put too fine a point on it. This had to be the same, with the not breathing and no heartbeat and the fact that he was far too pale and his movements seemed slightly lethargic. And yes, there was the vague peckish sensation that had him thinking that a nice calves' brain would taste quite lovely at the moment.

There was only one thing for it.

Find the nearest farm…no, wait…get back to headquarters. Yes, that was it.

When he was behind the wheel of Lola, pulling out from the gas station – after filling up, of course; he even left the proper change for the fill-up, even though the cashier was on the floor behind the counter, _sans_ brain.

Phil knew he should be bothered by that.

The other zombies hadn't left any brain for him. That was just plain selfish.

* * *

Phil really should have expected all those weapons pointed at him as he brought Lola in for a touchdown in the landing bay.

Mack even had a fire axe. Which made him look like more of a badass than he usually did and would have been particularly effective against the Zombie Horde.

"I know how this looks…" he began, raising his hands because really, he'd already died twice, he didn't want it to happen a third time. He was a little concerned about just how sepulchral and slow his voice sounded, but figured that was all part of the Zombie Experience.

"You mean," Skye growled, the hangar shaking just a little around them, "that you're a zombie with weird glowing eyes but you're not attacking us for our brains?"

Yes, he could always count on Skye to put things into perspective, even when she was busily freaking out judging from the earthquake rattling in the background. "That's exactly what it looks like," he agreed.

"What happened?" May asked softly, lowering the pair of knives she'd been pointing in his direction.

So Phil explained about the attack in the toilet – although he didn't, in fact, mention that part, only saying it happened at a gas station – and how he'd somehow been changed but not like the other zombies. "Can someone give me a sitrep?" he demanded, slowly lowering his hands and opening Lola's door.

"We're still gathering intel," May answered.

"Although we think the Zombie Apocalypse started at a private lab somewhere in Illinois," Simmons put in. She was gazing at Phil almost avidly, as if she couldn't wait to get her hands on him…and not in a pleasant way…for him, at least.

"How do we know that?" Phil asked, climbing out of Lola, and bemoaning the fact that he'd gotten gore all over her leather seats.

"We've traced the pattern of outbreaks," Fitz answered, resting the chainsaw he'd been pointing in Phil's direction against his leg. He must have noticed Phil's surprise at the weapon, because he shrugged. " _Army of Darkness_ is one of my favorite movies."

That would certainly explain it, but there was just something so incongruous about Leo Fitz using a chainsaw to fight the Zombie Hordes…it was like a puppy using a flamethrower to chase squirrels.

Oh, and speaking of flamethrowers…he had to wonder just how Hunter had gotten his hands on one, especially one that closely resembled the proton packs from the original _Ghostbusters._

"It's confined to the United States," Simmons went on. "The zombie venom is so fast-acting that the airports and such were shut down after the first reports."

"Zombie venom?" Hunter asked.

Phil didn't even bother to hide his eyes rolling, because asking that sort of question was a sure-fire way to get both Fitz and Simmons to start lecturing, using words that no one had any clue knew what actually meant.

Sure enough, Simmons' eyes lit up – not glowing, so there was no worry there – and she began to speak in tongues…well, science tongues, that was. Phil only got about every tenth word, and it took Skye to finally interrupt and say, "So, if something infects you by biting you, then it has to have used some sort of venom?"

"Exactly!" Simmons beamed. "I'll know more once I run tests on Director Coulson, but I think I can safely say it would be a venom that somehow killed its host without really killing them."

"I feel dead," Phil said. He did; there was no reason to deny it.

"I'm not sure that's entirely accurate," Simmons answered. "But, like I said…tests."

"Come along, Coulson," May added, slipping her knives into the sheaths at her waist, and then stepping aside so that Phil could follow Simmons to the lab. He had the distinct feeling of being _ushered_ , and he didn't quite like it.

"There's something in Lola's trunk that Fitz and Simmons might find useful." Ignoring the looks he was getting, Phil slipped around his precious vehicle and popped the trunk.

The writhing, hissing zombie didn't look best pleased, but then Phil didn't really care…not sharing your victim's brains with strangers had to go against the Zombie Code of Etiquette. It was a damned good thing he'd had those bungee cords handy, was all he could say. Letting a zombie loose on his base was the last thing Phil wanted to do.

Oh, wait…

* * *

"Well," Simmons looked up from her tablet, "it seems that the zombie venom is reacting with the GH325 in your bloodstream. It's turned you into some sort of Super-Zombie."

Phil barely resisted rubbing his forehead. There were a lot of days when he was glad that his best friend decided to raise him from the dead; however, this was not one of them. "So I'm stuck this way?" He hadn't wanted to sound so plaintive, but really he was just about fed up with this shit.

"Not necessarily." She consulted more readings. "It looks as if the GH325 is trying to cure you of the zombie bite, but whatever's caused the mutation into zombie is fighting back. You could, at some point, be completely cured…or else the venom wins and you go the way of that poor sod." She hooked a thumb back toward the small containment cell that Mack and Fitz had gimmicked up in order to hold the nearly frantic "true" zombie. It was made of clear polyresin and the marks of its trying to bash its way out were visible on the material.

It was disgusting, and Phil would have made some sort of gagging noise if he still had a gag reflex for that level of grossness to affect. "So, we just have to wait and see?"

"I'm afraid so, sir." Simmons fiddled with her tablet. "I'm going to run some more tests on our…guest, and see what I can come up with. If I can isolate the venom then I can start to work on some sort of anti-venin."

"Good," Phil said, not bothering to hide the fact that he wasn't exactly sanguine about the idea of becoming a full-fledged member of the Zombie Horde. "Do we have anything else on the outbreak?"

"Yeah," Fitz answered, buzzing into the lab, his own handheld computer tucked against his chest by his bad hand and his chainsaw at his back, held there by some sort of strap. "Looks like it's only affected about 38% of America's population. The other 62% credit their watching _The Walking Dead_ for knowing what to do in case of just such a Zombie Apocalypse."

Well, it _was_ a good show…although Phil himself preferred the comic.

"Hey," Trip said as he entered, "I managed to get in a supply of brains for you, Sir."

Phil was impressed, and said so.

Trip just shrugged. "It wasn't a big deal. I know a guy who works at a slaughterhouse and they always have extra on hand."

"No human?"

"Nope, just as you ordered."

Phil was relieved. The cravings for brains were coming back, and he really didn't want to chow down on someone he knew.

"That's something else I don't understand," Simmons said, chewing on her lip and frowning. "Why do you crave brain tissue? It shouldn't matter really, because your digestive system is completely shut down, so it's not like you can actually absorb whatever you eat or drink."

That was, of course, the moment that Phil realised that he'd never be able to drink coffee or eat those little convenience store donuts again.

He would have cried if it weren't for the fact that his tear ducts didn't work anymore, either.

* * *

Of course, it didn't take long for SHIELD's allies to find out that the Director was, in fact, now some sort of Super-Zombie.

Phil disconnected from Tony Stark after the genius had laughed until he began wheezing, gasping something about "irony" and "a dead organization being run by a dead man".

Of course, then Clint Barton showed up at the base for a visit.

If only to himself, Phil admitted that he'd long harbored very strong feelings for Barton. It had only been SHIELD's fairly strict frat regs and the fact that he'd outranked the archer that had prevented him from saying anything. Then he'd met Audrey, and he'd put those emotions aside in order to be with her, and really, he'd been very happy with her…until he'd died that first time, of course. Then all bets were off.

"You just had to go and be badass around some zombies," were Barton's first words, "didn't you, Sir?" He looked like he couldn't make up his mind whether to laugh or cry.

"That certainly wasn't my intention, Barton," Phil answered dryly. He shuffled around his desk in order to greet his former asset; another thing he'd discovered about being dead again was the fact that he didn't seem to be able to pick up his feet and walk like a normal person, which was going to play havoc on the soles of his shoes. And shoes weren't cheap in the midst of the Zombie Apocalypse.

"Wish I'd been there," Barton went on, "I would've watched your back."

Personally, Phil was glad that the archer hadn't been; his dignity had taken enough of a hit by being killed in a gritty men's room and having a witness would have made it worse.

"What's done is done," he said. "And now I have to live…" Phil cleared his throat, although there wasn't anything in there that needed to be cleared, since saliva was no longer an issue, "to _exist_ like this until Simmons finds a cure." One of the better things that had come from his new state was that he didn't need to sleep anymore, and it meant Phil was completely caught up with his paperwork for the first time since Fury had dumped a defunct SHIELD into his lap.

"The eyes are kinda cool, though," Barton commented, stepping closer. "We haven't seen that in any of the zombies we've fought since this shit started." Then he grinned. "I always suspected you were special, Coulson."

Phil rolled those "special" eyes. "I look like Basement Cat having been caught on film by a flash camera."

"You are such a nerd, boss," the ex-assassin said fondly.

"I'm technically not your boss anymore, you know."

"Yeah," Barton sighed.

He leaned against the desk, nearly inside Phil's personal space. He was glad he'd taken a shower; he really didn't think Barton would be so close if Phil hadn't scrubbed off the graveyard smell. It was one of the drawbacks of being undead.

"I feel like I lost my chance," Barton went on sadly.

Phil raised an eyebrow, curious to know what the other man was talking about.

It was like the eyebrow cut the last of whatever was keeping Barton from talking, because there was a sudden bout of verbal diarrhea from the archer. "It's just that…I've been thinking I had time, that it didn't matter if I never said anything right away, but that's changed because some asshole in a lab in Illinois decided that modifying a genetic virus in a failed attempt to cure cancer was a really good idea and no, couldn't possibly bring a Zombie Apocalypse down on the U.S. and so didn't take the proper precautions. You should have heard Banner bitch about it…and he's the King of Making Stupid Decisions Regarding Science so he should know, right? But I guess no one could have guessed that you'd get taken out by five zombies in a gas station…suppose that means there weren't any convenient bags of flour hanging around, huh? Cause you're a badass with a bag of flour, everyone knows that."

Now, Phil might have been moving a little slower than when he was alive, but there wasn't a thing wrong with his brain…unless one counts the need to eat other brains in order to compensate for his current state of deadness.

But it still took him up to Barton's comments about Bruce Banner and his bad life choices to actually get what he was trying to say.

Phil opened his mouth to reply, but Barton wasn't looking at him and apparently didn't notice, because he kept on talking.

"And Natasha kept on my ass about telling you, but I didn't listen and now I've lost my chance to tell you that I really, _really_ like you and I've been wanting to ask you out for months now, since we all found out that you were alive because Fury wanted to play God and bring his right-hand man and best friend back from being skewered by Loki. Yeah, of course I was a bit pissed off that we didn't know sooner, but it's SHIELD, so I get it. And I swore that the next time I saw Fury I was gonna hug him in the most public place I could find, just to let him know how grateful I was that you were still alive and that I might really get what I've always wanted…"

Well, damn.

Phil thought it was horribly unfair. Here was Clint Barton, sex on legs, saying that he'd wanted to try the whole dating thing with Phil Coulson, of all people, and it was after he'd done several rounds with stinking zombies and was now a zombie himself and couldn't do a damned thing about it.

No…unfair didn't even cover it.

How many nights had he laid awake, thinking about Barton and how he'd wanted to ask him out for dinner, and the movies, and then back to his place for coffee…and yes, "coffee" was a euphemism for rather energetic sex. He'd come intimately familiar with his right hand on many occasions, when Barton had done something that day that had driven his libido up the wall and into the next zip code. And then there'd been that one time he'd actually jacked off in his own office, after the Great Defabricator Debacle…he'd almost been caught too, and even now Phil wasn't completely unconvinced that Fury hadn't known exactly what he was up to…

And then he frowned, because he felt… _strange_.

Before he knew it, Phil had his belt undone and his trousers around his ankles, revealing…

Barton's mouth was wide open, his eyes boggling. "That's something you don't see every day," he commented, and if he was aiming for nonchalance it was a distinct failure.

* * *

Phil eyed the glass beaker that Simmons was holding out for him.

The scientist sighed. "I need a sample."

"You're kidding," Phil answered, knowing with the lower key his voice had taken that he sounded particularly forbidding.

"No, Sir. I need a sample of the ejaculate in order to find out what caused the erection when, in fact, you shouldn't have had one at all since your circulatory and endocrine systems are both dead…no offense."

"None taken." Phil was starting to get a bit used to the zombie jokes by now.

"LA LA LA LA," Fitz was singing off-key loudly, his hands over his ears.

"Oh Fitz," Simmons groaned. "Will you grow up?"

"I am an adult," he argued. "I just think that I don't need to hear that my superior officer has erections. There are just some things that should be kept to oneself."

"It also glowed," Barton added, smirking. Phil knew he was more than pleased that it had been thinking of him that had caused Phil's penis to…show itself.

"At least you wouldn't miss the mark in the dark," Hunter snarked, coming into the lab minus his chosen flamethrower for once.

"That is not a good idea!" Simmons exclaimed. "The glowing certainly indicates that the…phenomenon has something to do with the GH325 formula, but we cannot be certain that the zombie venom in the Director's body wouldn't be communicable."

Phil's eyebrows went up as far as they possibly could at Simmons' proclamation. "Are you saying that I could pass along the Super-Zombie attributes to someone I happen to have sex with?"

Fitz started singing just that much louder.

"What a way to go," Barton murmured, licking his lips. "Super-Zombie STD…"

No, Phil didn't even want to _think_ about Clint Barton and necrophilia in the same sentence.

"You always were a kinky bastard, Barton," Bobbi piped up from the doorway.

The smirk grew into a shit-eating grin. "I never heard you complaining, Morse."

Hunter joined Fitz in the off-key chorus.

"Fine," Phil capitulated, if just to get Hunter and Fitz to stop making so much racket. He took the beaker, pushing air out of his lungs to simulate a sigh. He was getting a bit better with faking living mannerisms.

"Look on the bright side, Sir," Simmons said, sounding far too chipper for anyone's good, "at least it's not falling off."

And with that, Phil beat the hastiest retreat he could, which to be fair wasn't very hasty at all.

* * *

"Jesus, Coulson," Fury growled, striding into Phil's office as if he owned it.

Well, maybe he did. The jury was still out on that, really. Fury might have been officially dead, but he'd been the one to set the Playground up, and as long as he was alive there were times when Phil believed his friend would just march right in and take command once more. After all, Fury was the biggest control freak on the planet. Just how long could he really stay "dead" before he got bored?

A bored Nick Fury was an even more dangerous than usual Nick Fury.

"You just had to go and undo all my good work," he went on, slamming himself down in the visitor's chair and propping his boots up on Phil's desk.

"And I was supposed to know there was a budding Zombie Apocalypse going to overtake me on the way back from my mission?" Phil groused.

"Mission my ass. You were going to see a man about replacements for your Captain America card collection."

It was a good thing that even a Super-Zombie couldn't blush any longer. "You're the one who should be replacing them, not me. I wasn't the one who ruined my first set just to make a point."

Fury waved a hand, dismissing the notion. "At least you didn't go entirely dead. That would've been awkward."

"Awkward for who, exactly?" Because Phil thought it was pretty damned awkward for him at the moment.

"I'd hate to have had to take over SHIELD again. This is your baby now, and I don't want to have anything more to do with it."

 _For_ _now_ , was the unspoken phrase.

"And you're here to check on me, I take it?" While it had irritated him before that Fury hadn't trusted that Phil wouldn't have gone bug-shit crazy after the TAHITI treatment and had had May spy on him, he'd eventually realized that it had been out of true worry and not because Fury had thought he'd screwed up by using a procedure that had driven everyone else who'd had it insane and was now afraid that Phil would do the same. So now he was unbelievably touched by the fact that Fury had cared enough to even try bringing him back from the dead.

Fury made a rude noise, which Phil took as assent. "Had to make sure you didn't go shambling through the place, moaning _BRRRRAAAIIINNNNSSSS_."

"Agent Triplett has done an excellent job in keeping me in my chosen meals," Phil said primly. "I have yet to fall back onto zombie stereotypes."

Well, there'd been that one time when he'd shuffled into the lab, arms outstretched and moaning that very word, scaring the life out of Skye and Hunter…which had caused a localized earthquake that made it onto the local news and the Weather Channel. The last thing they'd needed would have been for Jim Cantore to show up.

He hadn't done it since. May had been pissed enough to get completely silent with him, which was saying something, and Bobbi had bitched about the shelf in her closet collapsing, spilling her sex toys all over her quarters.

"That's good to know." Suddenly Fury turned serious. "Honestly, Phil…how do you really feel?"

"How do I feel?" He mused about it for a second. "Well, apparently I'm the very first zombie Director of SHIELD, which is saying something. I can't eat, drink, and I don't sleep anymore. I can't have sex…and of course that's when I find out that Barton's had unrequited feelings for me and we could have been doing it over every available surface for _years_. People tend to turn the lights off if they know I'm coming because they think it's hilarious the way my eyes glow like Basement Cat having been caught with a flash camera."

It was a good simile…why not use it again?

"You and your "I Can Haz Cheezburger" addiction," Fury laughed. "And didn't I read in Simmons' report that your dick glows too? Or was that only in certain circumstances…like fantasizing after Agent Barton?"

"Be that as it may," Phil said, making a mental note to talk to Simmons about just what she included in reports that other people could see. "I simply don't think people take me seriously any longer as Director." He also didn't mention the Grumpy Cat mug. He'd been so certain that someone had been trying to say something about him that he'd overreacted slightly, and had had to apologize to Fitz when he'd thrown it against the wall.

Super-Zombies tended to have slightly higher than average strength and a distinct temper, which had been added to Simmons' growing list of Just What the Dead Weren't Supposed to be Able to Do.

It had also been a good thing that the Zombie Apocalypse was nearly over, and he'd been able to send Hunter out to buy another one. The look on Fitz's face at the destruction of the mug shouldn't have had the effect it had had on Phil's undead heart.

"Sure they do!" Fury exclaimed. "You not turning into one of the many zombie clichés has only added to your badass reputation. Hell, I fucking wish it had been me, 'cause there's nothing like beating being zombified to enhance your standing among your peers and subordinates."

Was "zombified" even a word?

Well, Phil supposed it was now, after the country had gone through it.

"I'm quite sure that Simmons will work it out," Fury went on. "Also she's got Banner in her corner, as well as several other scientists out there. We'll have you back to normal in no time." He shook his head. "I gotta be honest with you…your voice is fucking creepy though. You should see if you can keep it after being cured; it would scare the shit out of _any_ recruit. Hell, I wish you'd had it during those halcyon days of teaching Advanced Improvisational Weaponry at the Academy, it would have made it so much easier to get those lessons through those kid's puny little minds."

Fury had a point about that.

"Look, Phil," he went on, lifting his feet off the desk and sitting up straight, which in Fury-speak meant, _I am going to be completely serious and then we'll forget this conversation ever happened._ "You do know I trust you, even though this is the second time you've died on me, right? You were a good Director, a good Agent…and a good friend. I wouldn't have resurrected you in the first place otherwise."

Phil figured he'd have been getting choked up by all the free-flowing emotions if he was still alive. Instead, he countered, "And you're speaking about me in the past tense."

Fury shook his head, laughing. "If that's all you took out of that then you're still the same bastard you always were."

"I'd hate to change things now."

His friend simply rolled his one eye. Phil considered that a win.

* * *

"Excuse me, Sir," Simmons said, poking her head around the door jamb.

Phil had learned very early on that it was best that he eat in his office. Skye and Trip had attempted to get him to dine with the other members of the team, but that had been a bust when Hunter had let slip that Phil had been eating monkey's brain one night.

The disappointed and horrified look on Fitz's face had almost been enough for Phil to give up brains for good. Of course, that only lasted until he started craving them again the next day, although he made certain that Trip didn't get any more like that. Phil figured he'd equate monkey brains with betrayal for the rest of his existence.

But hey, at least he hadn't lost the table manners his mother had taught him, which of course put him above the rest of his zombie brethren. He'd wondered vaguely if Zombie Etiquette had included eating with a fork and knife instead of ripping skulls off to get to the brain would make people not look down so much on the Zombie Horde.

"Yes?" he inquired politely, wiping his mouth with a napkin.

Simmons' eyes tracked to the bowl on his desk, and shook her head. "That just shouldn't be possible," she muttered just loud enough for Phil to catch what she was saying. "There is no scientific basis for the zombie need to eat brain matter…it just doesn't make any sense…"

"Simmons?" he prompted before she got lost in another rant about how his being a Super-Zombie was an impossibility and how she just needed more evidence. He'd given her enough of his dead body for testing, thank you very much.

"Oh, yes…sorry," she visibly pulled herself together. "It seems we may have found a cure."

Phil couldn't help but smile. Simmons shivered at the expression. That, in fact, pleased him to no end, but he couldn't say why. "Very well done." He stood. A lot of people would be very happy by that; especially Captain Rogers, who'd been pissed off when Citi Field had been used as a quarantine for all the zombies in New York. Phil had been surprised that his hero had become a fan of the New York Mets, and when he'd asked there'd been a long, rambling explanation that had ended in him calling the Dodgers "traitors" and how it would be a cold day in hell when he'd support a team that would willingly leave their home turf.

"Doctor Banner figured it out," Simmons went on as they walked toward the lab together; she was moving slower in order to keep up with Phil's zombie shuffle. "With input from me and all those tests I did on you and our zombie guest –"

Phil nodded. Apparently getting upset with a zombie for not sharing was a good thing.

"– and we discovered…"

And off she went.

Phil was very fond of Jemma Simmons, but there were times when she simply didn't realize that not everyone was as smart as she was. That could, of course, be a good thing…until she had to explain things, and then it was problematic. However, it was a part of her, and Phil wouldn't change her for anything, so he let her ramble on all the way to the lab, where she finally wound down.

"It wasn't all that difficult to isolate the zombie venom," she said as she made her way over to her computer. The rest of the team had already gathered, either by some strange form of shared telepathy or because they'd been called to meet them. Phil was actually leaning toward the former, because they were just that good.

"Once we did that," Simmons went on, busying herself with several of the pieces of equipment scattered about, "it should have been easy to come up with the anti-venin. But…the venom seemed to keep on mutating, and it was difficult to pin down. But, thanks to Dr Banner, we finally managed." She lifted up a sealed test tube, in which there was a muddy colored substance that seemed to writhe on its own.

It was really creepy.

"That's really creepy," he said aloud.

There was universal agreement.

Simmons went into another explanation that Phil couldn't quite follow – and he knew he wasn't any sort of idiot, so he didn't feel bad about it at all – until Skye piped up. "So you're saying the zombie stuff –"

"Venom," Simmons corrected.

"Yeah, right…you're saying it's really a living organism?"

"Well, to be fair, all viruses and such are living organisms, but venom isn't supposed to be."

"And it's obvious that stuff is," Mack pointed out. Phil didn't think the man had been parted from that axe since the whole Zombie Apocalypse started. With the plaid shirt he was wearing today it made him look like an extremely dangerous lumberjack. "Just from the way it's trying to get out of that test tube."

"Exactly!" Simmons beamed, as if Mack was a student and she was proud that he'd come to that conclusion.

"But what does that mean for Phil?" May asked, staring at the test tube, and if her gaze could kill it would have crumbled into dust.

"And why don't you have that stuff in containment or quarantine or whatever?" Hunter wanted to know, eying the tube warily.

That was a good question, and Phil echoed it. The last thing they needed was a zombie SHIELD, like their reputation wasn't bad enough already.

"Oh, it's fine," Simmons waved her free hand airily. "The medium it's in prevents it from getting out, plus the tube is vacuum sealed. It's perfectly safe."

"That could explain the need for brains and everything that zombies shouldn't be able to do, because the venom needs it to survive," Fitz suggested, rubbing his chin

"Of course!" Simmons exclaimed. "You're absolutely right, Fitz! That makes perfect sense!" She looked ecstatic.

Of course she would be; this probably answered all the questions her little scientist heart had. Phil would have felt pleased for her, except this wasn't getting him back to human.

After all, he had Barton to do…um, SHIELD to run and he couldn't do that as well in his current condition.

Yes, that was his story and he was sticking to it…if anyone asked, of course.

"What this means," Simmons said, "is that we've been able to reverse engineer the venom and have come up with what we need to cure it." She turned toward the clear prison where the zombie had been held.

"Is he supposed to be dead?" Phil asked warily, taking in the curled up body within it.

Simmons looked upset. "The injuries he received when he was changed into a zombie were too bad for him to survive the process of being changed back into a human. We…didn't take that into consideration." She went from contrite to excited in .04 seconds. "But you were only bitten in the shoulder, Director. Since we got that cleaned up and taken care of right away, even though it didn't heal there should be no problem."

"Has anyone actually survived?" May demanded. She was tense, and Phil just knew that, if she could, she'd have fought the needle that appeared to be in his future if it meant saving his life…well, his existence, at any rate.

Then the image of May wrestling with a man-sized hypodermic flitted through his mind, and he had to stifle the laughter that wanted to escape.

Phil cleared his throat, which had the effect of everyone turning to stare at him. Alright, so zombies shouldn't need to do that. "May's question is valid, Simmons."

"Oh, yes! Dr Banner used the anti-venin already, on a zombie that wasn't so damaged, and it worked perfectly." Simmons frowned suddenly. "Although, I'm not sure that Mr Stark was happy that it was Justin Hammer that it worked on…"

Yes, Phil could see it.

"Okay then," he said. "Let's get this show on the road."

* * *

After that, the Zombie Apocalypse ended rather anti-climactically.

With only a little bit of agony Phil Coulson came back to life. The first thing he did was look in a mirror, sighing in relief when he saw that his eyes no longer glowed. No more jokes on _that_ front.

The second thing he did was…well, no one needed to know the details of that, or just what he fantasized about to achieve it.

And, that he hadn't had to wait long before those fantasies became reality, and he had to admit his imagination hadn't been all that great. Clint Barton was a beast in the sack, and that pushed far more buttons than it should have. Becoming a sex fiend at the age of 50 wasn't something Phil had counted on.

However, once in a while Phil had a craving for brain, one that he didn't share with anyone except Trip, because he was such a wonderful enabler and knew where to get the good stuff.

He still hadn't been able to get the blood out of Lola's upholstery, though…


End file.
